The Weight of Spring and the Scarecrow King
by CaughtInTheRa1n
Summary: If he looked up he'd see Arthur, posed like a scarecrow in the hall, watching him with those blank eyes. They'd slow when they passed him, the guards, so that Arthur's gaze drilled into his sloping shoulders, and they would revel in those moments of helplessness before seizing Merlin's wrists and leading him up the stairs. Oneshot. AU. Hurt!Merlin. Enchanted!Arthur. Good!Morgana.


**Hello! I know, I know, I need to update "_Everything."_ And I will! I just... got a little distracted with this little story. It's a different writing style than my other ones, and it's an actual one-shot with a conclusion and everything!**

**I hope you enjoy it.**

**~Ra1n**

**Warnings: Descriptions of violence, torture, and injuries. **

* * *

Arthur would stand, as he always stood, in the hallway outside the tower. And Arthur would watch, as he always watched, the guards take hold of Merlin's wrists and lead him up the tower's winding steps, his head bowed with exhaustion, his hair, long and curling behind his ears, falling into his face. His pale bare feet touched the stones softly, his body doubled over to protect his sinking stomach and aching ribs.

He never spoke.

Arthur would watch as day after day they brought Merlin down, limp between the guards, his toes scraping the floor, his fingers stained red where he'd tried to staunch the flow of blood from one wound or another. Arthur distantly wondered what information they wanted from him, but knew that whatever it was, Merlin wasn't giving it up, and wasn't that so Merlin? To be too stubborn to stop his own torture?

* * *

Merlin couldn't understand the questions anymore, which was just as well, because he wouldn't answer them anyway. He knew what they wanted.

Morgause had wanted to control Arthur, had made a plan and followed through on it weeks ago. With her training as a priestess Merlin couldn't stop the spell from happening, hadn't realized the spell was happening, until Arthur banished Gaius and Gwen and the knights to the dungeons in a fit of rage. And at that point it'd been too late to really break the spell, not without help, and the walls of Camelot had become darker and tighter in the weeks before Merlin had figured out what was happening. So he'd done his best—a counter-spell, which had seized Arthur up like a rag doll. Conscious but glassy-eyed, unable to be manipulated by Morgause but also unable to manipulate himself.

Arthur had become a puppet under the curse of Morgause, but he'd become a statue with Merlin's spell.

Merlin wasn't sure how much of Arthur was in there- how much was suppressed by Morgause and how much was freed by the counter-spell- but however much it was, Merlin would not give up on him or Camelot, no matter how many times he was paraded by Arthur's expressionless face standing in the corridor, no matter how many times Morgause smirked and lead the king away, no matter how many times she slunk into the tower room and spoke about his friends in the dungeons, the chaos in Camelot's streets.

He wasn't sure how she figured out that he'd been involved in the counter-spell. It was obvious that she was unaware that he was Emrys, but she was aware that he had magic and that meant he knew Emrys, somehow, in a way that neither she nor he fully understood, and maybe if she just hurt him enough, goaded him enough, cast spells and fire and lightning on him enough, he would say how. And if he said how, she could somehow reverse the spell, continue her plan, use Arthur as a puppet once again, as if the entire kingdom wasn't aware that Morgause had taken over, as if the plan wasn't in shambles already-

The door to his cell opened. Merlin groaned and sat up, leaning his back against the wall. He would not stand (Even if he could stand, which was getting more and more difficult with each passing day, the way his joints creaked and his soles burned and bled.), because that would mean making the process easier. That would mean giving up. He was not giving up.

He did sit up, though, because otherwise they would just kick him, and he much preferred to be dragged into a standing position than he did getting kicked into complacency.

The guards, as they always did, seized his arms and pulled him to his feet, grunting in frustration when Merlin refused to cooperate, refused to get his feet underneath him, slid from their grasp until they held his biceps so hard they bruised (_again— _there were already bruises on his biceps) and pulled him bodily from the cell. He kept his eyes on the ground, counted the tiles and stones between the dungeons and the long walk up to the spiraling, dizzying tower. If he looked up his stomach would churn. If he looked up he'd see Arthur, posed like a scarecrow in the hall, watching him as he passed with those blank eyes. They'd slow when they passed him, the guards. They'd force Merlin into a stilting shuffle so that Arthur's gaze drilled into his sloping shoulders, and they would revel in it, those moments of helplessness, before seizing Merlin's wrists and leading him up the stairs.

It hurt to see those eyes. The combination of relief that Merlin's spell was holding even with whatever magic-suppression spell they'd cast on Merlin still in place, and the pain of knowing Arthur was gone, was able to watch Merlin get dragged off by guards without any show of emotion at all, was as painful as the physical trials he faces upstairs.

Merlin knew that if Arthur was in his right mind he'd put a stop to all of this- to his imprisoned friends (who Merlin hadn't seen in weeks, maybe months) and Merlin's steady, daily torture. But that knowledge only took the bare edge off. The fact remained that it still _felt _like Arthur was allowing this to happen, on a subconscious level, and it felt more and more like that with each passing day.

They dragged him up the stairs and into the round tower room, shoved him into the same chair as always, held him there with their hands or ropes or magic or chains as Morgause's eyes glowed gold and the world slipped away. Again.

* * *

There came a day where Merlin no longer walked to the tower, where the guards slung a thin, bony arm over each of their shoulders and pulled him across the floor. Merlin's eyes were swollen and glassy-blue, like a blind man. He was bonier than he used to be. Arthur watched. Things happened and then other things happened. Arthur was in his chambers and then he was in the hallway. Merlin walked. Merlin was carried. Merlin was quiet. The hallways were quiet. His chambers were quiet. Arthur knew that was wrong, but not why, and what was he to do about it? Things just happened, had always happened, would continue to happen. That was it.

Until the day something changed.

* * *

Morgana had spent her days wandering about the castle. It was empty and strange, the hallways always changing and twisting. She was lost, always. Morgause had spoken to her and the hallways had shifted; the shadows had shifted. Nothing happened anymore- at least not _here,_ wherever _here_ was. Sometimes she'd see the shadows move and flicker, a door open up and then shut again. Her footsteps were silent and small. She was silent and small. The sun never set or rose, the light never changed. She walked on.

It occurred to her that she'd been enchanted.

The thought was fleeting; a realization that lived and died between breaths. She couldn't hold the thought in the ever-twilight of the twisted hallways of her skull. But she could pass by it, briefly, like someone she wanted to avoid, like an enemy she wanted to keep close.

It took days of walking by it to catch a true glimpse, and then it would scurry off again, the thought, like a rat.

She corralled it slowly.

* * *

Merlin was tired. He sat and looked at his arms, bound to the arms of the wooden chair with leather and iron. He followed the jagged pathway of purple-green veins and mottled, puckered skin up to his curled, trembling fingertips and wondered what day it was, what month. His fingernails were dirty and long and chipped. He wondered if Gwen was still alive, if Gaius was, if the knights were still huddled somewhere in the dungeons below him. The muscles in his back wouldn't stop spasming, pain running up his spine and shoulder blades and the back of his neck, behind his ears and inside of his jaw. He ached to curl into himself, to cover the oozing flesh of his soft belly, the lightning-burn down his breastbone. He wondered if this was what Nimueh felt like, the moments before she collapsed and disappeared forever. He could feel himself collapsing, feel himself disappearing forever.

He'd never been so exhausted.

His arms were far from him, someone else's, and Merlin couldn't look up from them if he wanted to, not even when the door opened and Morgause came in, not even when guards tightened the leather until it cut into his skin, not even when Morgause placed her cold hand on his ribs and ran her fingers over his bones, lighting each one with agony that made Merlin contort and whimper and shake. His fingers fisted of their own accord, his throat constricting. He coughed when she pulled away, his vision blurred with the jolt of his lungs in his shattered rib cage. Blood pooled in his throat and she healed it, just enough, so that breathing was difficult but possible, and she asked questions and said words.

It began again.

Merlin knew he would die. Not today, not tomorrow. Morgause healed and broke and healed again. There would come a day where he was too weak to be healed, even with magic, when he would give up breathing in the night, just to get some rest, just to sleep-

Morgause seized his chin and pulled, realigning the bent vertebrae in his spine, whispering spells that soothed and burned and itched. His feet were numb, his toes tingling. Something that wouldn't quite fix- something in his torso that had been healed wrong. Something that made his legs heavy underneath him, dead weight that dragged. She'd stopped burning him there. He couldn't feel it.

Merlin let out a hiccupy gasp and closed his eyes, tears spilling from the corners. Morgause held his chin more tightly, whispered something new. His eyes opened to look at her, to look at the shape she was pointing to. He blinked and blinked again.

Morgana.

Morgana, a shadow that detached itself from the wall and stood, hovering, behind Morgause. Her eyes were blank. Her brows creased. Her hair was long and wild. Her frame was thin and willowy.

"It would be so much sweeter," Morgause was saying, "if you're breaking point was my sister."

Morgana was weak. Merlin could see the way her legs trembled, the dark circles under her eyes. A spell if Merlin had ever seen one, something that lurched and jolted around the witch like a fever. She was like Arthur had been, distant and hollow. Merlin could almost summon enough energy to be disgusted with Morgause's tactics, if he wasn't using everything he had to keep his eyes open.

Why enchant Morgana?

The question must have been in his eyes, or his face. Or the way he breathed and twitched. Maybe Morgause had opened up his mind and crawled in, the way she had opened up his skin and muscles.

"A sensitive soul," Morgause was saying, looking at Morgana with love in her eyes. "I had to protect her from her own conscience." She looked at Merlin. "You know she'd almost forgiven you for the poison."

Another spasm shot up Merlin's spine. He gasped and arched, slipping out of Morgause's fingers. She grabbed his face again.

"But she won't. Not really." Morgause waved her free hand and Morgana came forward, like a dog on a leash, and Merlin's bloody throat filled with bile. "She needs to be shown what revenge is, how it feels. She deserves to avenge herself despite her… sensitive stomach."

She let go of Merlin harshly, and his head struck the back of the chair. Nausea leapt up his throat. His temples throbbed.

He couldn't hear Morgause give Morgana commands but he could see it through his lashes, his chin nearly touching his chest. The way she moved her fingers, the way Morgana's head tilted in response. Morgause took a step back as Morgana stepped forward, hand outstretched, a spell on her lips. It was Morgause's voice and it was Morgana's. It was some monstrosity of magic, of a spell casting Morgana to cast a spell, and it was somehow more painful than anything else Merlin had experienced, somehow something he couldn't retreat into his mind from, something he couldn't describe. There was yellow-white pain in his bones and behind his eyes, a roar of something high and bell-like in his ears.

_This is it,_ he thought, because maybe today _would _be the day he died, and wasn't that horrible and exciting?

The white light was filling his head now, something that stung. Merlin couldn't see anything- not Morgana nor the walls nor his own fingertips, which were spasming and scraping at the wood of the chair, driving splinters under his nails. The white was dirty and twisting like hallways, like confusion, and somewhere he could hear himself screaming.

Morgana was there and Morgana wasn't; she was in the white-yellow of his head and in the room that his body lay in, bound and broken and whimpering. Somewhere in-between, a rat scurried across the floor. Merlin twisted his head, his jaw locking, and struck his cheekbone against the wood of the chair, opening his eyes to gaze at the tower walls and Morgana's hollow shell and then closing them to stare at the pain inside his own mind. Morgana stood motionless, silently, her eyes wide, her long, sharp nails buried in the fur of a black rat behind his eyelids. They were lost, the two of them and the rat, and there was horror there, on her face. Horror and confusion, a young woman afraid of her surroundings, afraid of Merlin and all that he had done.

Merlin knew he was going to die, knew it like he knew his own name. He also knew that he wouldn't allow himself to pass through the gates of Avalon knowing that Morgana—sweet, confused, powerful, vengeful Morgana— was afraid of him. Not because he didn't deserve it. Not because he was a saint. But he was guilty, felt guilty, hated his own conscience and his decisions, and if he was going to die before Morgana then that would be poetry, that would be resolution, and he needed to say he was sorry.

He forced his aching jaw to move, to hiss through clenched teeth. His throat was raw. His voice was gone. He breathed the words instead of saying them, whimpered instead of spoke:

"_I'm- so- sorry."_

And they were in his mind and his skull, and the rat was bleeding with the pressure Morgana held it with, and she looked at him with surprise and something else, something darker, something gray, and the light consumed him once more.

He felt himself vomit, felt the warm, sticky bile fall onto his chest. It stung his wounds and throat and nose. He wished there was a climax, something that peaked and allowed him to die, but the pain was constant and the nausea rolled again and his ribs ground in his chest and Morgana was gone from his mind and still standing in front of him with her hand outstretched and time didn't matter, there was just the smell of sweat and stomach acid.

The spell faded. Eventually.

Merlin's eyes would not open, could not open, not when he was focusing so hard on breathing- _one thing at a time, Merlin, one thing at a time- _and he wished he'd died, felt his mouth say those words out loud between harsh breaths. Because now Morgause would heal him, and Morgause would torture him, and Morgana would open up his mind again and stare at him with horror, and this was never going to end, and Arthur was numb and gone, and Camelot was falling, and Merlin couldn't open his eyes and breathe at the same time, would never open his eyes and breathe at the same time.

He was just so goddamned _tired._

* * *

Arthur sat on the edge of his bed. Somewhere, Merlin was screaming. It was louder than it usually was, loud enough that Arthur couldn't sleep. Usually Merlin was brought down but today he'd stayed, and Arthur had been sent to his room. So he sat. And the screaming stopped. And he laid down. And the wind blew, colder than the winter, and the ground shook, and Arthur wished he had another blanket, wished Merlin would bring him another blanket, but Merlin was useless and far away, somewhere in a tower, screaming and then not screaming, walking and then not walking, thin and then thinner, bloody and then bloodier, and Arthur was bored with the days- the days and corridors and oh _gods,_ why was Merlin _screaming?_

Arthur's head was pounding. His stomach sick. The screaming was echoing in his head, the screaming of every night- of every week- of every month- of every long walk to his room and back, of every blank stare and passive glance- of Merlin's swollen, dull eyes and bleeding lips.

Merlin's bare, blistered feet and naked chest, limp and draped between two guards, head down and face down and unconscious, and gods, Arthur had been watching-he'd been _watching,_ and now Merlin had stopped screaming and Arthur was worried about being _too cold _while Merlin was _bleeding _somewhere and-

Arthur was standing in the middle of his room. The door was locked-why was the door locked? He needed to get to Merlin, needed to help Merlin, needed to make sure that whatever was going on in his head was some sort of nightmare that he'd awoken from. Merlin would be asleep. Merlin would be in Gaius's chambers. Merlin would be fine.

He rammed his shoulder into the door, felt how weak his muscles were, how hungry he was, how big his clothes had gotten on him. When had he last eaten? It didn't matter. He hit the door again, hard, and it came off its hinges, bent at an angle and knocked into a guard (and why was there a guard? It didn't matter, Arthur had knocked him out with the door).

The corridors were long and dark and cold, devoid of staff and royals alike. He remembered- distantly- the dungeons. The creaking of the metal bars in the dungeons. The staff in the dungeons, Gaius and Gwen and the knights peering out of the bars with anger and confusion in the dungeons- he needed to go to the dungeons.

He turned, his head spinning, and ran.

* * *

Morgana's chest heaved with exertion as she knelt amidst the ruins of the tower. Morgause lay somewhere in the wreckage, crushed beneath the crumbling walls and ceiling. She hadn't seen it coming- hadn't seen the way Morgana's eyes flashed green, the way she'd lowered her hand from its position against Merlin's fragile, vomit-covered chest. (He'd been murmuring something-_I wish you'd killed me-_and Morgana felt something hot and consuming in her own chest.)

Morgause _had _seen the way Morgana had whipped around to face her, rage and confusion in her eyes. She'd heard the way Morgana had growled, "you _betrayed_ me!" before turning the spell on her. Morgause hadn't fired back, only stopped the spell.

"I'm doing this to help you, sister," Morgause had said, shock in her voice. She hadn't expected the enchantment to break, hadn't planned on Morgana's eyes on her, dark and exhausted. Morgause had had a plan— Morgana would see what revenge felt like, would feel Merlin give beneath her hands, and then she'd be grateful, grateful that Morgause had helped her overcome her softness, understanding that Morgause _had _to enchant her, just for a little, just to show her—

But things had happened too early.

"And how long were you helping me for?" Morgana spat. Already she was readying another spell, already she was angry, already the plan had fallen apart—

"Would you listen to yourself? Would you defend the man who tried to kill you?" Morgause waved her hand towards Merlin, who was breathing shallowly, eyes closed, nose bleeding. He was so close. Morgana looked at him and the color drained from her face.

"You have _no right_ to use me," she said, "or my magic," she looked away from Merlin, "for… _that."_

"You're too soft, Morgana," Morgause said. "He deserves to die."

"He's not dead," she looked at him again. Swallowed. "He's-"

"I needed him to solve a problem."

Morgana made a strange noise in her throat as she thought: Merlin, too, had needed to solve a problem. She could remember the sleeping kingdom, his pale, thin face, his red-rimmed eyes, the way he cried as he held her, the way his arms trembled as her throat closed and her vision blinked. He'd been desperate. He'd been ruthless. He'd been heartless. He'd been-

_I'm so sorry._

He'd been sorry.

"I am not like you," she said. "And I am not like him."

"That's because you are still young." Morgause took a couple of steps towards Morgana. "Trust me. You will understand everything after this. You will understand why _this is necessary-"_

Morgana saw the enchantment even before Morgause had thrown it. The priestess needed Morgana's mind a little longer, just long enough to show Morgana what she was missing, and then she would free her from the magic and everything would be okay and—

The enchantment rolled off of Morgana like water.

Something hot blazed behind Morgana's eyes. Anger. Betrayal. There were no words in her head or in her mind, just the feeling of _you will not take me again_ echoing in her chest, and the spell— if it could be called a spell— that burst from her ribcage in defense brought Morgana to her knees, something feral and instinctual, and the walls had tumbled around them. The ground had shook.

Morgause fell before she'd been struck by the stones, something deeper and ancient pulling her to the earth and stopping her heart. Morgana felt nothing as it happened, only a hollow pit in her stomach as the stones settled.

She breathed quickly. There was dust in her hair. Under her fingernails. Her hand was sticky and she looked at it slowly, taking one moment to register the vomit and blood and pus on her hand, and another to remember why it was there. Exhaustion filled her bones as she turned her gaze towards Merlin.

* * *

The dungeons were dark and damp and very, very full. Arthur went from one cell to another, unlocking the doors and peering into the dirty, malnourished faces of family and friends and subjects, of nobles and knights and children. He could remember a few, could remember their trials, could remember the haze in his mind and the botched juries, the pleas of the innocent- he hadn't killed anyone, not that he could remember, but the memories reminded him that this nightmare was real, that he had no idea what was going on, that somewhere Merlin had been screaming and Arthur prayed that he was somehow in the dungeons with Gwen and Gaius and the knights. (He knew he wouldn't be- had too many memories of a tower, of spiraling steps, but he hoped those were false.)

He found them in the back of the dungeons, the knights and Gaius and Gwen. He hissed apologies. He stuttered out half-sentences. His voice was hoarse from weeks (months?) of disuse.

"I'm sorry," he'd say, then, "I don't know what's going on," followed by, "are you alright?" and "where is Merlin?"

They didn't know, only knew that he had been kept in a cell away from the others, that Arthur had been enchanted, that Morgause was destroying Camelot, that Merlin knew something that Morgause didn't, that it had been months- a thousand things that made Arthur's head hurt. They were hungry and dirty and tired. They were unharmed otherwise. He shoved the keys into the hands of Gwen. "Free everyone," he said, and made his way through his memories, taking turns and stairs and turns and stairs until he found the steps of the tower.

There was blood on the stairs.

_There was blood on the stairs._

Arthur stood at the bottom of them and looked up, at the trail of rusty-brown-red. It was old. It was new. It was layered on top of itself. Weeks of it. Arthur remembered Merlin's stained fingertips.

_Just go up,_ he said, and felt frozen.

* * *

Morgana knelt in the wreckage and loosened the leather belts on Merlin's arms. He was not murmuring. He was not gasping. His breaths were slow and uneven.

Morgana wanted to feel hatred. Rage. Instead there was horror. Nausea. Maybe there would have been rage, but she'd never seen anyone so small and broken. He was like a baby bird maimed by a cat- bruised limbs and torn flesh and bones that stuck at the wrong angles. Skin as white and translucent as wet paper and as purple as the night sky.

His head was bowed. His feet and chest bare. She pulled him from the chair and into her lap, tucking his matted, greasy hair under her chin. He was taller than she was, but so much smaller. He smelled like decay and hopelessness. He smelled like dying magic and burnt hair. The skin on his back was both charred and raw, pink and black, healing and bleeding. She was frozen by the smell of it, the texture of the moment. She needed to heal him, to kill him, to make the pain stop somehow, but all she could bring herself to do was cradle him in her lap and rock slowly, tears threatening to spill down her cheeks. She wasn't sure if she was mourning the loss of something, of Morgause or Merlin or something else, something small and cold in her chest, but she thought it was all three, maybe, or none at all.

Arthur entered just in time to witness the scene:

A nest of yellow stone and torched lumber. Morgana crying, cross-legged, into Merlin's hair.

The smell of vomit and stone.

Arthur didn't know what to make of any of it- Morgana was absent from all of his memories, had disappeared months before anything had gone wrong. And where was Morgause?

There was a chair still standing in the center of the room. Heavy, wooden. Open restraints reaching towards the floor. Arthur knew what it was for, knew who it was used for.

_He'd stood by and watched-_

Arthur wondered what information Morgause had wanted, but that thought died out. It didn't matter what she'd wanted. Merlin had obviously not given it up.

Merlin.

Arthur wasn't sure if he should walk into the room, if he should make himself known. The scene in front of him was something private, something untouchable, and Morgana and Merlin looked like they'd both been through something heavy. Arthur wondered if that was what he looked like, wondered if his clothes hung from him the way Morgana's did. He thought maybe the answer was yes; maybe Morgana understood just as much and as little as he did.

There was no Morgause.

Morgana's eyes were red-rimmed and piercing when they found Arthur. There was no anger or surprise there, no thoughts at all. Just recognition. Arthur took a few steps into the room and saw a flash of blonde hair beneath the rubble. He understood.

"She wanted revenge," Morgana whispered, half-lifting Merlin's limp body towards Arthur. Arthur wasn't sure what the revenge was _for, _wasn't sure if he would ever ask, would ever know. It felt as private as the moment was.

Morgana knew there was more to it than revenge, knew that Morgause had discussed the plan with her _before _(not that Merlin had ever been mentioned in the plans before), knew there must have been a reason, a hiccup in the plan, that had made the torture drawn-out, precise, and purposeful. She didn't need to know those reasons. Something had gone wrong and some other things had gone wrong and maybe one day Merlin would tell them those things, would explain the scars and the empty weeks and the magic-suppressing spell that Morgana had felt come undone from him with Morgause's death. Maybe she'd teach him magic. Maybe he would have too much explaining. Maybe she would hate him by the end of it all. Maybe he'd never say anything.

She needed him to say something.

* * *

"I can heal him," Morgana was saying, and Arthur wasn't sure when he'd found himself beside her. Merlin was smaller than his memories served him, sicker and weaker and bloodier. He didn't know what was wrong— what _wasn't _wrong.

There was too much broken skin and spasming muscles and shallow, raspy breaths. Morgana's arms were wrapped around him and it looked like she was afraid to let go, afraid he would fall apart.

Arthur heard the rest of the sentence before it was said: _But I'll need to use magic,_ and he was nodding already. Morgana's magic was not a secret. Not anymore. Neither was the way Morgana's hands were trembling.

"I'm not good at it," she continued.

Arthur didn't care. "Anything," he said.

She nodded, silent. She looked at Merlin again. "It's summer," she said, absently.

"Yes," Arthur said, although he hadn't noticed before.

"It was spring before."

"Yes."

Morgana hummed, breathed through her nose, hugged Merlin tighter, murmured something into his hair.

Her eyes lit. Merlin's breathing deepened.

She breathed again. He coughed, gurgled. Clots of blood dislodged themselves from his throat and hit the stones. Arthur winced. Morgana winced.

She breathed again. Soft damage, tissue and muscle, filled itself where it was gone before, in the crags of his back and chest and stomach. He was still thin and bent, but his breathing was smoother. His skin no longer oozed blood. The scabs were turning brown with age, flaking off to reveal silver-pink scar tissue.

"I don't know the bones," she said.

"Someone else will," Arthur replied. The implication was not lost on Morgana. The thought of magic being welcomed into Camelot's halls, if only for this one task, filled her chest with static and warmth and a little bit of something akin to pain.

She stood with Merlin still in her arms, tripping over stones. She was weak. Arthur held her at the elbow, steadied her. He was weak. His throat was dry from the dusty air. They stepped over debris, over strands of blond hair and bloody yellow brick. They wound down staircases.

Arthur decided he would burn the tower, with its blood-stained steps, to the ground and crush what was left of its remains when he was finished.

But that would be later. Right now it was carrying Merlin through the halls to the physician's chambers, which were hot and stale and untouched save for the vials that had been knocked from their shelves when Gaius had been arrested. He was in there already, mud from his cell still on his robes, dabbing at the infections that the dungeons had dredged up. Peasants and nobles alike waited their turn, all dirty and hungry and tired-looking. Morgana and Arthur walked by all of them. There were murmurs. Gasps. Arthur wished he had something to cover Merlin with—a blanket or cape or curtain— but it was over too quickly, and Gaius cried when he saw him in Morgana's arms.

"My poor boy," he whispered, a bony hand on Merlin's cheek. "We'll take care of you."

* * *

And they would, between the arrests of Morgause's men and the reuniting of families, between the rebuilding of walls and wells and thatched roofs. Between the documents submitted by Morgana— court sorceress— and the watchful eyes of druids and healers and round-table knights.

And it was slow, between the millions of tiny events that make up rebuilding a kingdom and the millions of tiny cracks in each of Merlin's splintered bones. It was slow and it was difficult and it was exactly the opposite of what Merlin would want it to be, once he woke up, because he _would _wake up, dammit, he'd been patient for too long and alone for too long and still for too long.

And his speech would be slurred, his tongue thick. And he would cry. And his conversations would be unintelligible. And he wanted it to be _easy _and _quick_ and it wasn't any of those things when it took so much effort to just move his tongue in his mouth or his toes in his boots.

He couldn't walk and he hated it. Something about the bones— something about time. Something involving lying very still and tangling his fists in the sheets below him and whimpering as hands pressed on his spine and hips and legs, grinding them into place and apologizing for the pain.

It drove him to silence, and Gwen mourned the loss of him, not in body but in mind, and maybe he knew he was causing her pain, and maybe he wasn't strong enough, not right now, to put someone else's feelings first and speak. Even when Gwen cried and Gwaine made lame attempts at conversation and Arthur apologized and Morgana tried to catch his eye. Gaius pressed on his hips and back day after day until Merlin was sure that this was the same as before, that maybe he wasn't strapped down and maybe his magic wasn't suppressed but the pain was the same, all pain equals pain, and if he'd had the strength he would have used his broken, ugly voice to say, "stop, leave me be."

(But he didn't have the strength, so instead he laid very still and willed something, anything to end, be it the pain or his life or his ability to feel anything below his waist, and maybe Gaius was seeing progress, because Gaius _was _seeing progress, but Merlin could only attest to the intense, throbbing pins and needles that filled his knees and feet with pressure.)

* * *

His first steps were when he was ten months old and they were, again, at twenty-three, in Gaius's chambers, eight months to the day after the tower was burned to the ground by Arthur and Elyan and Leon and Gwaine and Morgana.

His toes were still mostly-numb and sometimes stinging, or both, and his feet were clumsy and curled inward as he leaned against Arthur and shuffled across the wooden floorboards, but there was a smile on his face, almost, and there were certainly smiles on everybody else's, and Lancelot and Gwen even clapped, until Gaius walked in and chastised everyone for dragging Merlin out of bed and things seemed normal, almost, for the first time in a long time.

Later, Gaius called it a miracle, which Merlin thought was a useless way to use the word, because the proper term was _magical, _and being as it was no longer illegal to say it, credit was due where credit was earned. He said that, too, in his not-quite-but-almost-healed voice.

Morgana asked him about the magic two months after that, when Merlin was allowed to limp through the halls if supervised, and Morgana found ways to be supervisor more and more often until finally she mustered up the courage to ask, and Merlin had turned very red.

Yes, he had magic. No, he wasn't ashamed.

"But you haven't told Arthur," Morgana had said.

"No."

"And," Morgana's voice was carefully detached. "You didn't tell me."

There was hurt there, because Morgana had been afraid of her own magic, had confided in Merlin, had suffered with it alone. And there was pain written across Merlin's face, and Morgana saw something else, too—fear, as deep or deeper than her own, and when she asked how long he'd had magic and he'd murmured, "forever," she'd felt the years of hiding herself mirrored back and back and back, imagined that fear but as a baby, as a child, as a teen, and she wondered if Merlin had been crushed by it.

She was still angry at his silence, even if she almost understood it. To know his magic was to know him, to submit the most vulnerable parts of him, the parts that would get him killed or banished. And he hadn't been brave enough for her, although he had been brave in other ways. It didn't make her less angry, but it would let her forgive him, eventually, when the anger died down (and it would die down, just not right now).

* * *

"You were the hiccup in the plan," she said after a couple of nights of silence and slow, controlled breaths. Merlin didn't understand the significance, but Morgana had already strung the story together: Why Morgause's plan had gone wrong, why Merlin was questioned. Everybody knew pieces; Arthur's enchantment somehow went wrong, Morgause thought Merlin knew something for some reason, but it was all vague and unbased, and nobody had the heart to force Merlin into spilling details (he'd only truly begun speaking recently anyway), and nobody suspected Merlin had magic.

But now it made sense: Merlin had stopped the enchantment, Merlin had been tortured in Morgause's attempt at gaining control. Because Merlin had magic.

Secret magic in a land where magic was finally free.

* * *

The secret came out five days after that, and it was not due to Morgana's prompting, although she suspected the conversation she'd had with him aided in the inspiration. Rather, it came out in a breathless rush one morning without preamble, to Gwen first and then Gwaine and then Arthur and the knights, because it had been ten months and Merlin was still very tired, and magic was legal (and he decided that if he didn't tell Arthur _now,_ he never would, and that sounded like the worst way of dying).

There was anger, of course. And the words _betrayal _and _liar _were swapped back and forth, and the whole long story of enchantments and secrets and dragons (which was another upset in and of itself, even for Morgana) was uncovered slowly. Merlin was even more tired when he finished, and Gaius had to help him, because there were some stories that Merlin had forgotten had happened, even, and by the end of it, everybody had pretty much figured out why Morgause had questioned Merlin so thoroughly.

The Emrys thing had mixed reactions, but it was mostly a lack of being impressed- the only person who'd heard of Emrys was Morgana (and Elyan, sort of- and Gwaine thought he'd heard the name once or twice).

Which resulted in Morgana offering to forfeit her court sorceress position in favor of Merlin taking her place, which Merlin declined. Even though he had a whole lot of magic, he knew next to nothing about the craft itself, and it was decided that he'd be better suited as a coordinator of magical defense, where power mattered more than understanding- and it was obvious he knew more about strategy than he'd ever let on as a servant.

The anger faded.

Merlin got his own quarters- though he spent a lot of time in Gaius's, because old habits die hard, and of course he was still saving Arthur's backside (though it was just much easier to do it when it wasn't a secret, and when Morgana could help him).

Things didn't go back to the way they were, but they did turn into another type of normal, not a back-to-normal but a forward-to-normal, where things had changed and that was a little bit of good and bad. Merlin had a limp and a neckscarf. Morgana was confident and wary. Arthur was king and still only the third-most-powerful being in court (a fact that Gwaine liked to tease him about mercilessly during trainings).

And Camelot watched as spring came again.


End file.
